The present invention relates to a motor drive apparatus for a disc reproducing apparatus, such as a video disc player, having an arm feed device for feeding a pickup arm and an automatic loading device for automatically inserting a jacket with the video disc into a player body or for pulling the jacket from the player body, in which the motor drive apparatus serves as a drive source for both the arm feed device and the automatic loading device.
Developments have recently been made in a reproducing apparatus using a video disc or a PCM recorded disc. In a video disc or a PCM disc, signals are recorded in the form of small pits by means of a digital recording system. However, in a video disc or a PCM disc of this type, deposition of dust or dirt from a user's hand results in signal dropout, thus significantly degrading the quality of the reproduced signals. Furthermore, since the signals are digitally recorded, a pickup element for picking up the recorded signals must be very accurate. However, this means that the pickup element is more subject to damage due to dust or dirt from a user's hand.
In view of this problem, a reproducing apparatus for a video disc (hereinafter referred to as a video disc player) is proposed wherein a video disc can be loaded and unloaded from the player body without requiring the user to touch or hold the video disc.
In a conventional video disc player, separate motors are required for driving the arm feed device and the automatic loading device. This requires separate driver circuits for the motors. However, the provision of separate motors and separate driver circuits increases both the manufacturing cost and the installation space, and therefore, the player body cannot be made compact in size.